Objectivity

The Mets should trade Jose Reyes, we are told. He does not have a high On-Base Percentage for a leadoff hitter, we are told, and he is injury-prone, we are told. Never mind that neither of these claims is true (leadoff hitters don't have high OBPs in general, and Reyes had one injury in 2009 aggravated by the idiot trip to Puerto Rico last year and prior to that had been fifth in the Majors in games played from 2005 through 2008). Reyes is in the final year of his contract (that part is true!) and the Mets will not want to pay the nine-figure contract deal they'd need to give him to keep him for a low-OBP (not true!), injury-prone (not true!) leadoff hitter/shortstop.

And, in particular, we are told that the Mets will trade him, because Sandy Alderson is a fan of sabermetrics and moneyball and so on and so forth, and therefore will not consider fan adoration. He'll just trade Reyes, because It Makes Objective Sense. But there's a problem here: what the Mets would probably get for Reyes in a trade in June or July would be a couple of medium-level prospects, probably pitchers. The Mets have some pretty damn ass-kicking pitching prospects already, mind you. Moreover, historically prospects gained in trades have a tendency of doing very, very poorly. The odds of getting someone who will be even close to Reyes-caliber eventually from a Reyes trade is tiny. So objectively, it doesn't really make sense to trade him. And the argument that Sandy Alderson will definitely trade him because he doesn't value stolen bases and he thinks Reyes' OBP is too low and he thinks Reyes will be too expensive and he will want to restock the farm system overlooks one thing, namely that Sandy Alderson also doesn't think that it's usually a good idea to try to import a big-name free agent superstar onto your team. He's said that he thinks that tends to mess up team chemistry. Well, okay: if you aren't going to get new superstars, doesn't that just make it that much more important to hold onto the ones you already have? And he's said explicitly that fan animosity was a part of his decision to cut Castillo and Perez. None of this is non-objective, mind you: fan animosity was probably a big part of what was making Castillo, at least, have trouble playing well. And fan adoration is probably a big part of what helps Jose play so well. So objectivity is about a lot more than saying, "low OBP, has been injured, is in walk year, we must trade." There are a lot of other factors to consider, and they all point toward trading Reyes as being a big, big mistake.